


See Us Sleep Behind The Glass Unaware Of Crime

by semiautomagic



Category: Twin Peaks
Genre: Headcanon, I absolutely love these two together, Inspired, M/M, Pre-Canon, What-If, caring Chet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-11
Updated: 2018-01-11
Packaged: 2019-03-03 14:38:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13343322
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/semiautomagic/pseuds/semiautomagic
Summary: Sometimes you just need someone to talk to. Someone to smoke with. Someone to understand.Chester is a very good 'someone'.





	See Us Sleep Behind The Glass Unaware Of Crime

**Author's Note:**

> on one particularly gloomy day I've came across this resource and the great people that share their creation and stories here. one of them, namely 'And the Devil Makes Three' by Nemo_the_Everbeing caught my special attention and set me on a fantasy trip of What-Ifs. so this is one of my variations on what and how could the things turn in the aftermath. with a lot of my own assumptions and a bit changed time setting. here that wasn't their first case, etc etc  
> hope it's not too confusing.  
> and this is NOT a sequel or anything.

When Cooper finally leaves for his very special very agent deeds Albert is left alone in the lab. So he lets himself stand in silence for another long moment staring at nothing in particular with mister Jeremiah Stone laying on the slab waiting for his autopsy to be performed.

Rosenfield breathes a quiet breath and picks up the scalpel. But when he leans a bit forward to start the Y-incision he realizes his hand is shaking so heavily he cannot afford himself to make even the first cut. It is weird because Albert didn't feel a damn thing ever since the word  _"just"_  escaped Phil's lips two days ago. He didn't feel anything when he entered the Bureau yesterday. And felt nothing when he came to work earlier today. But when  _Cooper_ entered the autopsy suit exactly as he always did, without knocking, Albert flinched. When Cooper  _smiled_ at him, just a little guilty — or perhaps it was just his own imagination playing tricks on him — Albert felt dizzy. Then uncomfortable. Then he gathered himself and half-smiled back, because Cooper said  _"thank you"_  and  _"it's good to see you back"_. Medical examiner nodded and then froze like a freaking wooden doll when Cooper walked closer and _hugged_ him.

Albert didn't have the heart or strength to return the gesture. He just tapped him a little on the shoulder and then thanked all the Gods known to him for Cooper finally leaving. He was aware of the emptiness inside him, the one that would never be filled. Aware but now unconditionally put up with it. After all, Jeffries was right. Albert might be hollow, but he was still  _himself_.

Yet right now he cannot cut the guy on the table because his body is shaking.   
Because it disagrees with the mind, because it's simpler and it  _reacts_.

Rosenfield puts the scalpel down and sighs but the shaking ain't going anywhere. So he returns the Stone guy into the freezer and calls Desmond.  
  
  
  
  


In exactly five minutes and forty three seconds they are outside and smoking. Albert is sitting on the parapet and starring blindly into nothing, breathing in and out smoke after smoke. Chester is standing right beside him shooting concerned looks at his friend from time to time and desperately trying to find a way to start some sort of a conversation.

"You still haven't told me what happened back then", he manages after finishing his own cigarette. "You seem okay. But, let's be honest. We both  _know_.."

"I  _can't_ ", Albert finally looks directly at his colleague and for the first time Desmond feels like he is really there. "I'll get you a copy of the report I'm preparing for Jeffries but other than that.. I just  _can't_. Maybe one day, Chet. Not today."

They stay like that, looking wordlessly at each other, letting their eyes do the exchange of whatever they both have inside, what they think, what they feel, what they want. Then Albert moves and breaks the eye contact so he could start on another cigarette. Chester remains silent and motionless; chainsmoking is not a new thing to him either.

"At least tell me who beat you up like that."

The question makes Rosenfield falter for a second and his sight freeze. This condition lasts for only a heartbeat that he himself skips as the hole inside him squirms at the memory.

"It was done by Cooper's hands", he says, his voice flat, carefully picking every word and placing it one ater another like they're made of a fine porcelain.

Now it is Chester's turn to freeze his gaze on Rosenfield but there is literally nothing written on his face, like he is made of stone. Like he is empty. A beat passes and then another. Deep inside Albert knows that Jeffries in fact  _was_ right about everything. After all, Phil got into this shit long before him, it is only natural that he knows more and he knows better. Of the things they are doing. Of the things they are  _facing_ , of the battle they all are fighting. And especially of the people like Dale Cooper. People Albert knows absolutely  _nothing_ about.

"Does he remember it?" Desmon's voice is low but firm yet at the same time somehow he manages it to sound tender, velvet-like. The question and its meaning still breaks the silence into million sharp pieces the same way the reality broke Albert Rosenfield apart days ago.

"I don't know", comes out just as hollow and lifeless. And it's true. He doesn't know — they didn't have a chance to talk much about it the very day it happened and after Albert  _ran_. When he stopped there was no coming back and asking this sort of thing simply because how would you ask if someone remembers trying to beat the life out of you while under a possession of sorts? Besides he wasn't sure if he really  _wanted_ to know.

"Well, that explains a lot", Desmond comes closer but doesn't risk putting a hand on pathologist's shoulder even though he wants to. There is an unspoken question in Albert's look when he turns to Chester, so he clarifies a bit. "You wince a little every time he is around. When he comes near, when he speaks your name or just addresses you. When someone mentions him. And not in the same way you used to."

"Is it so obvious and showing?"

"To be honest.. I don't really think people care."

The silence washes over them again, smouldering on the tip of Rosenfield's forgotten cigarette and then dispelling in the wind with its ashes. Albert lets it. He lets his life burn down so he can build it back up from those ashes, from broken hopes he didn't even know he had and fallen beliefs, from the lost friendships and all the shattered illusions he let Cooper drag himself into.

"I bet you didn't want to come back", Chester is frowning. He knows Albert far better than anyone else in the Bureau, even better than Jeffries, despite the fact the two of them never discussed the same Blue Rose stuff. "Why did you?"

"Because Phillip was right", this part comes easy. Albert now knows the mantra gets easier with every time he repeats it. With enough times he might just believe it himself. "Because this all", he gestures with his hand all around him meaning the whole world probably, not only Headquarters, "is bigger than me, and the pure reason, the fight, the _difference_ is enough. He said, one day the sadness will end. Moreover.. The Blue Rose is not just about Cooper. There is also Gordon and Phillip. And you", he turns to Chester and manages a smile and a pretty real one if only his eyes were smiling too. "Who would look out for you if I quit, right? You might have rejected me as a lover, but surely accepted as a friend. That's already more than I could ask for."

"God damn it, Al, I still feel guilty. It's like if I haven't broken up with you, you wouldn't be stuck with all this Cooper shit." The look on Chester's face is too sincere and precious and this time Albert smiles for real.

"Don't be so sure. Maybe it all happened the way it was meant to. Maybe there is someone out there made specially for you."

"You must have spent too much time with those wackos. Now you talk about Inevitability too."

"Guess it sticks to you after all", Albert shrugs. Jeffries did say they have forgotten how the ordinary world worked once. "But you do know that no matter what we've been through, the disposition remains the same."

Chet nods and ultimately puts his hand on examiner's shoulder. "I love you, Albert Rosenfield."

After all they've seen and after all they've did they are still only in the beginning of the journey. The Rose might lose some of its petals, it might even lose some of its buds but as long as the  _roots_ are intact it will continue to bloom. The leafs will be greener and fleshy, the smell sweeter and more intoxicating, the thorns sharper and ever more poisonous. The path before them one day will lead them both to their own inevitable — the Disappearance and the Fall, the Reunion and the Ascension. Their fate is sealed with blue petals and red drops of blood, with lives lost and virtues forgotten, with opaque dreams and malicious spirits, with things that scare us, with all our pain, with secrets and desperation, with falsity and mistrust. With everything that surrounds them, with every people they've met, with everything they've sworn to fight.

But this very moment is almost crystal clear. This very moment is what keeps them for now.   
Keeps them going, keeps them standing, keeps them from the darkness all around. Their hearts are stained, some even broken on the edges, some bear cracks and flaws but they will endure. For the sake of everyone around. For the sake of themselves.

 _"Who will look out for **you** , Al, when you will do all the looking?"_, is the question that was floating in the air between them but was never actually asked.   
_" **Maybe** you'd volunteer here"_ , is the answer that was never actually given.

Albert's hands are not shaking anymore. "I love you, Chester Desmond."

**Author's Note:**

> the title courtesy of the song 'Deliberation' by Katatonia


End file.
